Thursday, January 21, 2010

Recommend Me Friday



Recommend Me is a new meme hosted by Neverending Shelf. Each Friday, pick a favorite read, whether it's a recent read or one that is a touchstone book for you.

To play along, grab a favorite read and tell us about it. You can include your thoughts about the novel, its summary, your favorite memory related to the novel... the possibilities are limitless. If you are up for a challenge, you can also include:
  • Your review of the novel
  • Links to others' reviews of the novel
  • Recommending to a general group of readers or if you want to be extra daring, to specific reader friends
 My pick:
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee


From Goodreads:
Lawyer Atticus Finch defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic, Puliter Prize-winning novel, a black man charged with the rape of a white woman. Through the eyes of Atticus's children, Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with rich humor and unanswering honesty the irrationality of adult attitudes toward race and class in the Deep South of the 1930's.



Throughout my teaching career I have been an outlier in my departments because I chose to close the door in my classroom and shun the sacred literary canon, replacing the "classics" with more contemporary, minority literature. To Kill a Mockingbird is one of the exceptions. Yes it's a classic, but the story was so far ahead of its time that Scout is still fresh and sassy and timeless. Lee is a master storyteller  with strong subplots and memorable characters: Scout, Jem, Atticus, Dill and Boo Radley.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Great recommendation. I really enjoyed reading this novel when I was in school. It is definitely one of those classic must reads.

Marce said...

I bought a copy of this in Dec, will definitely read this year. I never had to read it during school.

Here is mine
http://teawithmarce.blogspot.com/2010/01/friday-recommend-me-still-alice-by-lisa.html